Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Jojo Rabbit Blu-ray Movie Review

Springtime for Hitler Youth?

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 14, 2020

Can the scourge of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party be a source for comedy? That may be a salient question occurring to some viewers as they watch the odd but engaging Jojo Rabbit, and while patently different in both style and content, a film like The Producers might provide a resounding answer of “yes!” to that query in any case. Making fun of Nazis in fact goes back at least to efforts like The Great Dictator and, later, even (to go from the sublime to the patently ridiculous) Hogan's Heroes, but Jojo Rabbit offers a tone that is decidedly different from any of these properties, with an intentionally provocative take on the era which posits a young German boy named Johannes Betzler (Roman Griffin Davis) who is seeing the epochal events play out from his own decidedly skewed perspective. That skewed perspective is in evidence from the get go in this often slightly surreal film, where it turns out that Johannes, who goes by Jojo and is ultimately given the disparaging nickname Jojo Rabbit by some Hitler Youth, has a most unusual imaginary friend — one Adolf Hitler (Taika Waititi, who also adapted the screenplay, winning an Academy Award in the process, and directed).

Jojo has just turned ten, and he and Adolf engage in a little team building exercise to help quell Jojo’s fears about joining the Deutsches Jungvolk, part of the Hitler Youth group that started Nazi indoctrination early. Jojo is on the small side, and he’s a bit of a nerd, but Adolf helps him to energize his enthusiasm, and Jojo and his best friend Yorki (Archie Yates) head off for their first Hitler Youth weekend camp. There they are put under the questionable tutelage of Captain Klenzendorf (Sam Rockwell), a hard drinking officer who lost an eye at the front and who nonetheless sees through the Nazi lies being spread by propaganda.

Jojo fails his first "initiation test" when some older Hitler Youth command him to kill a bunny, which Jojo can't bring himself to do (this in turn leads to his unfortunate nickname). After getting a little more esteem building from an often daffy Adolf, Jojo makes the disastrous decision to grab a hand grenade from Klenzendorf in order to prove his bravery, a decision which ends up with Jojo bearing severe facial scars and a rather pronounced limp. Jojo's mother Rosie (Scarlett Johansson, Academy Award nominated for this performance) of course wants to nurture her wounded son, but she also seems to understand Jojo is going to need to learn to fight his own battles, and she, kind of like Adolf in fact, encourages the boy to get out and about. In that regard, she also more or less commands Klenzendorf, who has been demoted due to the accident, to help Jojo fit in with the Hitler Youth and the whole Nazi regime in general.

While kind of doled out almost surreptitiously, information is imparted that Jojo’s long missing father may be a deserter, and adding to the family’s trials and tribulations is the fact that Jojo’s older sister Inge has died. Both of those traumas kind of fade into the subtextual background, though, when Jojo comes home early one day, hears some noise upstairs in his house, and discovers a “secret annex” (to quote The Diary of Anne Frank) behind the wall of Inge’s bedroom, a little cubbyhole which houses a Jewish girl named Elsa (Thomasin McKenzie). Elsa has been granted a reprieve from the Nazis due to Rosie’s kindness, but when Jojo’s initial shock gives way to his supposed “Aryan superiority” and he attempts to take control of the situation, he finds out that Elsa is no withering wallflower.

That is the basic setup of Jojo Rabbit, but the plot, while frequently bracing and often at least wryly amusing if rarely laugh out loud funny (as is perhaps appropriate, given the underlying subject matter), may take a back seat to presentational aspects and the characterizations in the long run. Jojo Rabbit kind of weirdly reminded me of Wes Anderson’s outings, at least in terms of a slightly twee tone and an emphasis on highly stylized performances. There’s also an intentionally off kilter feeling postmodernism at play that introduces elements like a montage of archival footage of actual Nazis doing the “Hitler salute” that plays to the Beatles’ German version of “I Want to Hold Your Hand”. When the film is funny (and it undeniably is, at least in my estimation), it’s often almost scabrously so, as in Elsa’s mental and physical takedown of Jojo, something that almost plays like one of those “alternate universe” outings by Quentin Tarantino.

Buffoonish portrayals of Nazis in general and Hitler in particular are just kind of de rigeur in the three examples I cite above, but what struck me as really interesting about this exploration of the same underlying conceit is how it’s often tinged with an undeniable menace, something that I’d argue is missing in at least two of the three examples I mention (I’d say Chaplin’s film probably comes closest to examining the sort of feeling I’m attempting to describe here, but I don't think even it creates the same bifurcated emotional ambience that Jojo Rabbit does). That really gives Jojo Rabbit some of its most visceral impact, especially when things build to a rather shocking climax.

Note: My colleague Brian Orndorf liked Jojo Rabbit even more than I did. You can read Brian's thoughts here.

Jojo Rabbit Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Jojo Rabbit is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. The IMdb lists a variety of Arri cameras and a 2K DI, but this is another recent Fox release like Ford v Ferrari where to my eyes detail levels often were precise enough that I wouldn't have been surprised if this had been a 4K DI. There's an appealing sharpness throughout this presentation that offers a really rich exploration of the film's both busy but at times kind of intentionally dowdy production design. What really stuck out to me, though, is the film's really interesting and at times very subtle grading choices. A lot of the film's interior work is kind of peach toned, with buttery yellows and just a slight hint of pink, but take a look at some of what are supposed to be traditional "Nazi red" elements, like armbands and flags in the accompanying screenshots, and perhaps you can make out how they're just slightly skewed to what I'd call crimson or wine or maybe even plum tones. A couple of the scenes in the "secret annex" offer somewhat lackluster shadow detail, a situation perhaps exacerbated by a prevalence of browns and other dark tones.

Jojo Rabbit Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Jojo Rabbit features a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix that derives quite a bit of energy from its sometimes cheeky use of anachronistic music. Several sequences play out of doors, and some of those feature elements like explosions, and there are very well done immersive effects in those moments. Even some interior moments, like a really weird scene inside a poolhouse where Nazi Youth are being trained for — well, I'm not exactly sure what, there are some appealing surround effects and a really nice recreation of the "echo-y" ambience of the building. Dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout, and there are no problems of any kind to note.

Jojo Rabbit Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 8:57)


• Outtakes (1080p; 3:26)


• Inside Jojo Rabbit (1080p; 29:46) is an appealing featurette with some good interviews, if an at times kind of "arty" style.


• Audio Commentary by Taika Waititi


• Theatrical Trailers

  Teaser Trailer (1080p; 00:59)

  
  

  Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 2:19)

Jojo Rabbit Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Jojo Rabbit is one of those sui generis offerings that is going to rise and fall for the individual viewer's tolerance for (some might argue surrender to) the film's unabashedly bizarre tonal shifts, not to mention the almost Looney Tunes-esque presentational aspects. I found some of this cartoonish element to wear a little thin after a while, but Jojo Rabbit's undeniable audacity really captivated me, and the film ended up providing a rather hefty emotional wallop. Technical merits are first rate, and Jojo Rabbit comes Recommended.